Australia's 2016 federal budget an 'election winner'

Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has on Wednesday declared the federal budget an election winner, after details surrounding this year's government spending were announced overnight.

Tax breaks for small business and middle income earners as well as investment in ideas and innovation highlighted the "careful economic plan" which Turnbull said would demonstrate to voters the coalition's strong long-term political strategy for Australia.

"I'm quietly confident that the Australian people will give us another term in government, but you can't take anything for granted," Turnbull told the Nine Network on Wednesday.

"It's a choice between me and (Opposition Leader) Bill Shorten. Who do Australians trust to manage this transition from mining construction boom to the new economy of the 21st century?"

The cornerstone of the budget is a gradual shift from the current, slowing resources-based economy, to a dynamic, Australian-owned business based one, and Turnbull said the July 2 election, to be formally announced in the coming days, would be based around ensuring the nation's future economic growth.

"Let me make it clear, everybody benefits from stronger economic growth and jobs," Turnbull told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) on Wednesday.

But Opposition Leader Bill Shorten argued that the coalition has turned a blind eye to education, something he described as the real foundation of growth in Australia.

"Unless we make sure we have world-class schools, unless we make sure that working-class kids can afford to go to university, unless you take real action on climate change, these are all handbrakes on growth," Shorten told the ABC.

Leading political commentators have said the government delivered a 'safe' budget, with the Nine Network's political editor Laurie Oakes describing the announcement as "boring" but responsible.

He told Nine it was a plan to regain the faith of Australian voters after the "horror" coalition budget of 2014.

"While it won't get anyone excited and people will have forgotten most of the detail by the election, I think Scott Morrison has created the right impression," the Nine Network's political editor Laurie Oakes said on Wednesday.

The Opposition's Treasury spokesperson Chris Bowen also criticized the government's tax breaks; he described the budget as big business smoke and mirrors, and said the government's small business threshold, where a vast number of cuts were going, was "bizarre".

Currently, small business is defined by one which has an overall turnover of less than 1.5 million U.S dollars, but the government wants to raise that to 7.5 million U.S dollars, something Bowen said should be considered a large business.

"We will not support the increase in the threshold, which eventually gets to a billion dollars," Bowen said on Wednesday.

Meanwhile Shorten labeled the government's wider budget plan as "mediocre", and said Turnbull was happy to take money from hard-working Australians but not those well off.

"This is a government who takes out a bucketful then hands back a cupful," he told the press on Wednesday.

Labor will have the chance to put forward its budget reply on Thursday night, when it is expected to support the government's stance on bracket creep, where inflation pushes middle income earners into the second-highest earning tax bracket which they might not be able to afford, but it is also expected to allocate more money into other sectors such as education and healthcare.

Source: XINHUA